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Tuesday, October 29, 2013

National Cat Day

Today is National Cat Day, an annual celebration which was founded by Colleen Paige of the Animal Miracle Foundation in 2005. The day is intended to raise awareness of the huge number of cats in rescues and shelters and also simply to celebrate the joy cats bring to our lives. Paige's goal for this year's event is to help facilitate the adoption of 10,000 shelter cats across the country. It would be amazing if this goal is met!

Nate can't really see the point of this day because every day is cat day as far as he is concerned. But he will never quibble with a feline celebration and, since he came from a shelter himself, he's agreed to help me share information on cat rescue and adoption today, as long as he doesn't have to get up from the couch.

According to the National Cat Day website, an estimated four million cats enter shelters in the United States every year. Unfortunately, between one and two million of these cats will end up euthanized. Statistics show that cats are far more likely to be relinquished to shelters than dogs and, once there, fewer than three in ten will end up adopted into a new home.

Black cats have an even more difficult time finding homes because of the superstitions associated with them. The Foundation specifically chose Halloween week for Cat Day in order to help shed light on this stigma.

If you're interested in adding a cat to your family, visit Petfinder.com and enter your city or zip code, then choose cat under "type." Sadly, I found more than 175,000 homeless cats when I searched my area.

In addition, the Cat Day site features an adoption portal to help match homeless cats with interested adopters and to link visitors with animal welfare and rescue organizations.

For more information on National Cat Day, including ways to help if you're not able to adopt, visit the Purina Petcentric site here. And check out the adorable video the people at Petcentric made to help spread the word about the day.

What a beautiful, heartfelt post! When we move to North Carolina in eight months (who's counting??), we're getting two cats. Enough time's passed so we wouldn't be replacing our Chester and Chena, just enjoying being tortured by two superior beings who will have their way--waaaa!--I miss that so much!

Happy National Cat Day! I have a friend that works here at the local shelter, and I know they have such a hard time finding homes for cats. I wish my husband wasn't allergic or I'd have a couple! Black ones too.

Aw, what a sweet boy! I had no idea about black cats until I adopted Cleo two years ago (she's all black with green eyes). It's terribly sad that something so stupid would lead to animals being killed. On the positive side, my Cleo has endeared herself to a friend so thoroughly that this friend is no longer superstitious about black cats! She was so bad before that she would turn her car around if she saw a black cat ahead.

@Yolanda, it seems like a lot of people are that way. I wonder what it is about cats that causes such bad allergies.

@EJ, LOL, I can understand your wife, I don't think I could handle another pet right now even though I'd love to have one.

@Shannon, I bet your cat is gorgeous! I never knew about it either until recently, and I didn't know there was a stigma about black dogs until I adopted Clancy. Bizarre to me. But that's great about your friend, how sweet. :)

Nate is adorable!! I'm a cat lover, for sure. I would have adopted (and will), but my last cat found me. He showed up at my window on a snowy night - on the second floor, mind you! - half-starved, half-wild, and half-grown, and won my heart on the spot. Nine years later and he's fat and happy :)

My black cat adopted me one night when he climbed in my car during a blizzard and decided I would be good enough to take care of him. He was in rough shape then. Now he loves life. I love the little guy.

Baby Moo's Great Escape

About Me

Author of the Polar Night series and The Ghosts of Aquinnah. My first children's book, Baby Moo's Great Escape, is now available! When not writing fiction, I love to write about animals and animal-related issues.